Daily Archives: March 28, 2012

Memento Mori by Muriel Spark
Published by New Directions Books (2000 edition)

In 1950’s London a group of elderly friends suddenly begins receiving strange phone calls – a voice says, “Remember you must die” and promptly hangs up. These calls soon have these people examining their own, and others’, mortality, and it also spurns secrets and lies coming to the surface.

Memento Mori, for me, was … interesting. Upon finishing it, I had this feeling like I was missing something. Like it’s an incredibly profound piece of literature and I couldn’t quite get why. I feel that there are a ton of metaphors and poignant things being said in this book but I maybe missed some of them. Like I’m not quite smart enough to understand.

However, the book did make me think. I don’t think I’ve read another book told from the point of view of the elderly. There is a woman here who lives in a nursing home, a woman who cared for a dying person, another one with dementia, and to be honest I don’t give a lot of thought to what it must be like to be an older person in our society. The book definitely made me think about that.

I don’t know, I think I need to take more time to digest this one before I can really decide how I feel about the experience of reading it and what it really means. Again, I get that this is an important work of fiction and I saw many interesting themes throughout the novel, but overall I think I missed a lot too. Maybe I should read it again?

Have you read Memento Mori? Or anything else by Muriel Spark? This is my first time experiencing her work so I’m curious to know what you guys think.